This former shipyard was the first home of the The Boeing Company, founded in 1916. Affectionately called the Red Barn, this structure was built in 1909, and became the historic birthplace of Boeing aircraft production. Starting with the Boeing Model C, all early Boeing production took place in this building. Here, the entrepreneurial spirit of William E.
Aerospace & Aviation
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public domain
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The Boeing Red Barn taken in 1937.
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2002
On this 84-acre meadow in 1904 and 1905, the Wright Brothers successfully mastered the mechanics of controlled, powered, heavier-than-air flight. The brothers also built the world’s first airport here, and in 1910 the Wright Company School of Aviation established a flying school on the site and trained many of the world’s first pilots, including some of the first military pilots, such as Thomas DeWitt Milling.
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public domain
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Orville Wright in flight above Huffman Prairie, covering a distance of approximately 1,760 feet in 40 1/5 seconds, Nov. 16, 1904
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Established in 1946 to provide a comprehensive test and evaluation site for tactical missiles, Point Mugu has been instrumental in the development, test, evaluation and in-service support of systems including Regulus, Sparrow, Phoenix, Bullpup, Harpoon, SLAM, Tomahawk, Standard, and Rolling Airframe Missile. The first missile launch from an operational submarine was also accomplished at Pt. Mugu.
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Aerial view of Naval Air Station Point Mugu — at Naval Base Ventura County, California, 2008
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2003
Igor I. Sikorsky, engineering manager of the Vought – Sikorsky Division of the former United Aircraft Corporation, used the Stratford, Conn., sites to design, build, and test his innovative helicopter designs. Sikorsky’s VS-300 model helicopter was the world’s first design which used the now industry-standard single main rotor with an auxiliary anti-torque tail rotor.
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Sikorsky’s VS-300 model helicopter
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AIAA designated Baddeck, Nova Scotia as a historic site, providing a plaque to commemorate the centennial of the first powered flight in Canada. On February 23, 1909, piloting the “Silver Dart,” J.A. Douglas McCurdy took off from the frozen surface of Bras d’Or Lake at Baddeck Bay, and flew for close to one kilometer before landing safely on ice. The plane had been created by Mabel and Alexander Graham Bell’s Aerial Experiment Association, formed in 1907 to build and fly experimental aircraft.
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The AEA Silver Dart, researched and built by the Aerial Experiment Association (AEA) under Alexander Graham Bell's tutelage in 1908.
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Getafe Airfield was the site of the world’s first successful rotorcraft flight, on January 17, 1923. Lieutenant Alejandro Gómez Spencer piloted a C.4 Autogiro designed and built by Juan de la Cierva, who tested a series of autogiros between 1920 and 1924 at the Getafe site. Cierva’s autogiros introduced important technologies and flight techniques that led to the development of helicopters and other rotary wing aircraft.
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Courtesy Wikicommons/Miguel303xm (CC BY-SA 2.5)
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Airplanes in the airport of Getafe, Getafe, Madrid
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2011
Pearson Field, named for U.S. Army Lt. Alexander Pearson Jr., a prominent early aviator who died in an airplane crash in 1925, is the oldest continuously operating airfield in the Pacific Northwest, and one of the oldest in the United States. In 1905, the field, then known as the Fort Vancouver Polo Grounds, was the landing site for a dirigible launched from the Lewis and Clark Centennial Exhibition in Portland, Ore. This marked the first crossing of the Columbia River by air, and the first time an airship was used to deliver a letter.
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Courtesy Wikicommons/John Kloepper (CC BY-SA 3.0)
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Pearson Field, in Vancouver Wa.
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2012
Bell Aircraft, founded in 1935 by Lawrence Dale “Larry” Bell, based its primary manufacturing facility in Wheatfield, New York, where several important aircraft were designed and produced. During the World War II era, the plant produced the P-39 Airacobra and the P-63 Kingcobra fighters. The P-39 was used to great effect by the Soviet Air Force, with the highest number of individual kills recorded by any U.S.-produced fighter aircraft during the war. The plant also designed and manufactured the P-59A Airacomet, the first U.S.
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Bell Aircraft Corporation's main factory in Wheatfield, NY (Buffalo / Niagara Falls) during the 1940s. This unit primarily produced the Bell P-39 Airacobra and P-63 Kingcobra.
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2012
On 19 August, the AIAA Historic Aerospace Sites Committee dedicated Kitty Hawk, NC, as a historic aerospace site, following a decades-long negotiation with the U.S Park Service. A historic marker was unveiled at a 0930 hrs ceremony as part of the First Flight Society’s National Aviation Day at Kitty Hawk. At this site on 17 December 1903, Orville and Wilbur Wright achieved the first sustained, controlled heavier-than-air flight of an aircraft, opening a new era of transportation throughout the world.
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Soaring flight, by Orville Wright, Kitty Hawk, NC, Oct, 1911.(10469 A.S.)
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New Innovation gateway
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Innovations
Long Range Weapon Establishment
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The 1940 Air Terminal is a beautiful and rare example of classic art deco airport architecture from the golden age of flight. Designed by noted architect Joseph Finger, the Terminal was built to meet Houston’s growing role as a major center for air commerce in the 1930s. Its grand…
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Lunken Field, now also known as Cincinnati Municipal Lunken Airport, opened in 1925 on ground purchased from the Cincinnati Polo Club. The nation’s largest municipal airport at the time, it attracted several aerospace enterprises, starting with early aviator J. Richard “Dixie” Davis, who…
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On March 16, 1926 Dr. Robert H. Goddard, also known as "the father of modern rocketry," launched the world’s first liquid propellant rocket from a point 1000 feet S.S.E. of the plaque on the property of the Asa M. Ward Family. Erected by the American Rocket…
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T.S.C. Lowe’s Observation Flight
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Farnborough's aeronautical history began in 1905 with the arrival of HM Balloon Factory in 1905, headed by Lt Col J.L.B. Templer. In 1908, the first powered aeroplane flight in Great Britain took place here, piloted by Samuel Cody. In 1912, Lord Trenchard established the first…
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Known as the birthplace of Naval Aviation, North Island was the site of the first successful seaplane flight and the first amphibious flight in the U.S., both made by Glenn Curtiss. The first Naval pilot, Lt. T.G. Ellyson, was trained here at the Curtiss Aviation Camp. A flight…
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